From the Ashes
by PrincessDaydream77
Summary: When Cygnus and Druella Black were killed in the burning of the Black family manor, their three daughters were left alive, but alone. However, when questioned by their Ministry carer, one of the girls was found to be uncorrupted by belief in blood purity. Separated from her sisters and sent to an unlikely adoptive home, can Narcissa rise from the ashes of her past and shine?
1. Burning Fear

From the Ashes

Summary: When Cygnus and Druella Black were killed in the burning of the Black family manor, their three daughters were left alive, but alone. However, when questioned by their Ministry carer, one of the girls was found to be uncorrupted by belief in blood purity. Separated from her sisters and sent to an unlikely adoptive home, can Narcissa rise from the ashes of her past and shine?

Disclaimer: It belongs to JK, not to me.

Chapter One

Emergency. It was a word that, as awful as it sounds, had become quite routine to the Ministry of Magic in recent months and the night of June 13th 1959 was no exception to that at all. In fact, that very night was the beginning of one of the most dangerous times in Wizarding history.

It had all begun when a woman had seated herself before the drawing room fire, deep within the Black family manor. Her three young daughters were long since in bed, the warm summer air tiring them a little sooner than in routine. '_With the Summer Solstice a few mere nights away, this is the quietest they are likely to be for a dozen days at least._' she thought, leaning further back into the velvet cushions of the armchair she occupied and opening a novel that was resting on the table.

A quarter of an hour later, the woman shut the book she was reading, a smile spreading across her face as she heard the door of the informal lounge click shut.

"Are the girls in bed?" the man in the doorway asked.

"Just about." she replied, moving from her place in the chair to the heavily-upholstered settee a few feet away. The dark-haired man crossed the room and sat down beside his blonde-haired wife, leaning back into the pillows and wrapping his right arm around her shoulders.

"It's rather strange, isn't it?" Druella sighed contentedly. "To think how much the girls have grown."

"I thought precisely the same when I went to check on them last night." Cygnus agreed, nodding his head slowly. "I know it's rather nostalgic of me, but I can still remember when Bellatrix was stealing my wand and toddling around casting spells. Andromeda chanting fairytales twenty times over, as if she wasn't sure we'd heard."

"Oh, I know!" Druella laughed, leaning her head back into the upholstery. "And don't even let me begin on little Narcissa. Nearly three years old already and I still feel as if it were only yesterday I brought her home from St. Mungo's."

Cygnus slowly nodded his head in agreement, following his wife's gaze to the family portrait hanging proudly above the mantelpiece. True, all three girls were still young, but in their parents' eyes, they were close to slipping away, each candle on their cakes a reminder that they would not always remain in their beds upstairs, that they would have their own lives to lead, ones that would hardly involve their parents.

Suddenly, a low rumbling sound came from somewhere outside of the huge manor.

"There's a storm approaching, it seems." Druella sighed, instinctively moving a little closer to her husband, as if sensing some disturbance. In response, he tightened the hold of the arm laid about her shoulders. Their eyes met for a moment as she turned her head, and the pure sadness mirrored in them was unmistakable. It lasted for naught but a moment, however, as the sadness was replaced by fear at another, far louder sound.

It was at that moment that Cygnus and Druella truly realised how little time they had, and that they had a decision to make. It was a simple choice, one of two options, but it was an almost undoubtedly lethal decision either way. Still, there was only one route that could be taken, and both knew it.

The short walk up the stairs took only half a minute at most, yet it felt like a lifetime to Druella, knowing it would be the last time she would do so. The coward in her screamed to run, hide and not look back, but her motherhood retorted that she would be a monster if she did so. Of course, the motherhood prevailed and she charged into the room, running to her eldest daughter's bed and shaking the cocoon of blankets vigorously, ignoring the groans of protest from within.

"Bellatrix, get up. Up! Bellatrix, now!" Druella cried, repeatedly hitting the girl through the covers.

"Why?" came the sleep filled murmur from the blankets.

"No questions, just move!" came its reply. Bellatrix could hear her mother's anxiety through her anger, and could feel it in her heart, not to mention the blossoming bruise on her left side from her mother's attack. That was why she reluctantly sprang out of bed.

"Good. Now wake Andromeda, I'll fetch Narcissa. Hurry!" Druella instructed her daughter, running from the room to the one three doors down. There she reached down into the crib and plucked her youngest daughter from the bed, wrapping her blankets around her and bobbing her up and down as the girl began to wail in her arms.

"Ssh, Narcissa, ssh. I know that you don't want to get up, but we don't have a choice, sweetheart. Ssh." Druella was almost sobbing as she held her daughter, as she walked through the door back to the corridor, knowing each step she took was one step closer to parting with her daughters.

The other two of the girls were waiting outside Andromeda's bedroom when Druella returned to them, looks of worry and fear mirrored from her face to their own.

"Mother, what's happening?" Bellatrix asked, visibly shaking a little as spoke.

"I can't tell you that, Bellatrix. You only need to know that you need to get out of the house, as fast as you can run."

"Are you coming as well?" Andromeda piped up, answering the question that she knew Narcissa would have wanted to ask, if she knew the words to do so.

"I will do. As soon as I've found your father, I'll be out there with you as well." It truly stung Druella's heart to lie to her seven-year-old daughter, but it could not be helped. They would never go if they knew the truth, and she would have to watch them be destroyed. She could not allow that to happen. She would not.

As soon as she heard this, Bellatrix reached out her arms to take Narcissa, who was now crying profusely at being separated from her mother. Ignoring this, the eldest girl held onto her with one arm, grabbing Andromeda's hand with the other hand to pull her along behind her.

"Mama!" Narcissa whimpered, disliking the urgency of the situation.

"She'll be with us in a minute, Cissy, but we need to get out first." Bellatrix explained, her pace quickening even more, in hope that it would mean that their parents could get back to them faster.

Unfortunately, just as the thought went through Bellatrix's mind, the house ten metres behind them erupted into flames. All three girls turned, Narcissa beginning to scream, while Andromeda and Bellatrix clenched their hands together, watching in silence as their lives were changed forever.

A/N: Please let me know what you think! I really value all my readers opinions.


	2. The Wrong Answers

Chapter Two

A/N: Thanks to brilliant reviewers, NicoleKidmanFanXD, , Guest, dream-on-sunday and Riding-Lover-17. I couldn't have asked for a better reception.

Deep within the Ministry of Magic, Bellatrix, Andromeda and Narcissa sat together in silent tears. They had been there ever since the Aurors had arrived at Black Manor, just a few minutes after the fire had broken out. No one knew who had called them, as they had remained anonymous, neither did they know how the person had witnessed the fire, but either way, the girls had been removed from the scene.

One thing worrying Andromeda, the only one who had been paying attention to what the various people had been saying, was the name they kept repeating, every few minutes that they spoke in passing, their voices low so as not to disturb the girl, but not low enough that she couldn't hear them. They talked about… Death Eaters.

She had never, to her knowledge, heard the name before, nor read it in any book or magazine that she could recall, but for some reason, it still felt strangely familiar. Ominous, even.

At long last, the door of the room opened, revealing a redheaded woman holding a clipboard and quill. She looked to have a kindly expression on her face, but in all honesty, the girls were past caring. Their parents were gone and they weren't coming back. Nothing else really mattered now. Life would never be the same again.

"Hello, girls. My name is Elizabeth, and I'm just here to ask you a few questions. Is that alright?" she asked in a sickeningly sweet voice, bending down to the ground in front of them.

"Well, it's not as if we have a choice, is it?" Bellatrix quipped, lifting Narcissa from her lap to Andromeda's as she exited the room with the woman.

After twenty long minutes, Elizabeth returned to the room for the third time, where Narcissa sat alone on a cushioned chair, fiddling awkwardly with the hem of her nightgown, which she had still been wearing when they left the house. The house that was now nothing but ash and a ghost of a family's life.

"Your turn, sweetie." she told the girl, her comforting attitude almost visibly false even to a toddler. Narcissa did not really want to go with the woman, but she had little choice, as she was not old enough to walk away from her, so reluctantly allowed herself to be carried away.

They eventually ended up in a room even more remote than the one they had just left, the walls feeling as if they had begun to close in on the young girl, who was still pointlessly struggling to get away from the confines of the place. When she was finally released from the woman's arms, she was placed down on a hard, barely cushioned chair, while Elizabeth herself sat down on an identical one opposite, leaning forward on it to look her in the eye.

"Now, Narcissa, I know that this has been hard for you. You're only little, so to have your parents taken away from you is such a cruel thing to happen. But now, we need to decide where you are going to live."

"Mummy." Narcissa interrupted, whispering the name of the person that she wanted to live with most. In response, Elizabeth heaved a sigh, one half full of sorrow and half of impatience.

"I know that you want your mother back, Narcissa, but I'm afraid you can't have her back. In the meantime, I need to ask you a couple of questions. Is that alright?" The woman only waited for a nod from the child before continuing. "Right. First of all, would you want to live with family or friends of your parents, or with someone completely new?"

"Don't mind." she responded quietly, trying desperately to think of what Bellatrix and Andromeda would have answered. If they all gave a similar response, then they would certainly remain together.

"Alright." the redhead said with a nod, scribbling something down on the clipboard. "Would you like to stay in this country for certain, or would you not mind going abroad?"

"Here." the blonde answered. This was one thing she was utterly certain of. She had never been abroad before, and enjoyed living in Britain. It was all she knew, and she wanted to cling to what little things she had left of her old life.

"Good." Elizabeth said, once again making a note of the girl's responses. "Finally, would you like to live specifically with a Pureblood, or do not mind about Blood Status?"

This was the question that threw Narcissa. She truly didn't know. Thinking of what Bellatrix would say, she knew that the girl would not have paused before spitting back her answer of Purebloods. But would Andromeda? Probably not. Desperately trying to choose between her sisters, Narcissa gave the only answer she could think of giving.

"Doesn't matter."

With a final flick of her quill, Elizabeth stood and exited the room, leaving the toddler alone and afraid. She had no idea if the answers she had given were the correct ones and could only hope for the best. It wouldn't be too drastic if she had made a mistake and had given a different answer, would it?

It wasn't long until she found out, as a few minutes later, the door opened and Elizabeth returned, with Bellatrix and Andromeda in tow behind her. For some reason, they seemed to be a lot more upset than they had been before they'd left. Maybe they were just as scared as she was. Narcissa hoped that was the explanation and not something far worse.

"Now, girls." the Ministry woman began. "We have taken into account your responses to our questions and have come to an appropriate decision, one which we hope will benefit all of you. Bellatrix and Andromeda, I'm afraid that you will have to wait here while we contact your new guardian. Narcissa, you can come with me now."

Now extremely confused, the girl turned to her eldest sister, who was fighting to hold back her tears. Looking slightly past her, Narcissa could see that Andromeda was doing the same. Returning her gaze to Bellatrix, her eyes blurring a little, Narcissa breathed deeply and spoke.

"Bella, what's that mean?" she asked, her breath hitching in her throat with the girl's response.

"It means that you have to go, Cissy. Just you. They're splitting us up."

A/N: Thank you for reading, now please review! Make me happy, I'm ill!


	3. Safety Once Again

Chapter Three

A/N: Thanks, dream-on-sunday, JustaBitBored and Guest, for reviewing.

As the sun began to rise in the sky, Narcissa sat once again in a room on her own, tears streaming slowly from her reddened eyes. The rivets of water had not ceased since she had discovered the Ministry's plans for she and her sisters, and she could still barely understand what their separation would truly mean for her.

Watching unblinkingly as light streamed through the window, the infant hardly noted the opening door, or the two women that walked in through it. They were silent, not giving her any notice that she was there, in an effort not to shock her. But, though she was young, Narcissa was not ignorant. She noticed enough to know they were there.

"Narcissa?" asked one of the women. Elizabeth had returned once more. "Narcissa, are you awake?"

"Yes." the girl replied, biting back the urge to say more, as Bellatrix undoubtedly would have done. Even if she was leaning against the back of the chair, it was utterly ludicrous that the woman expected her to be able to sleep after all she had lost the previous night.

"Good. Well, Narcissa, I wanted you to meet the woman that you're going to go and live with from now on." she continued, bending down to the girl's level as she spoke extremely slowly to her. '_If she is a mother, I really do pity her children.' _Narcissa thought cheekily, bringing a slight smile to her face, though she tried to disguise, in case Elizabeth thought she was happy about being split away from her sisters, which she most certainly wasn't. "Her name is Minerva McGonagall."

At the sound of her name, the woman named McGonagall stepped forwards, enough into the light that Narcissa could identify what she looked like. She was quite a pretty woman, who must have been only thirty at the most, with dark brown hair and emerald eyes, not dissimilar to the qualities of her father's appearance. From the way she walked and the way she acted, the child could tell she was a nice person.

"Hello, Narcissa." the woman said, bending down in front of the child. '_Her voice is nice, as well_.' Narcissa added inside her head. The list of reasons why she liked the woman was growing by the minute. "My name is Minerva McGonagall. I work at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Do you know where that is?"

By way of response, Narcissa gave a clear nod. She may not have been told much about the world outside the Pureblood circle, but Hogwarts was something every self-respecting witch or wizard had to know about, no matter what age they were.

"Well, after what happened last night…" the Scottish woman began, choosing her words carefully. "I would like you to come and live with me at the school. If you would like to, that is."

Narcissa did not know what to say. For a long time now, she had wanted to visit the historic building, to see what was so special about the place, and now she was being offered the chance to live there. It was hardly believable.

"Well, Narcissa? What do you say?" asked Elizabeth, her tone hardly changed from the first time she had spoken to her, still just as slow and sickly sweet as ever.

Narcissa said nothing, but she hardly noticed her head subconsciously nod, her mind showing her agreement without truly thinking about it.

"Good. Well, then… Professor McGonagall, would you wish to leave now?" the Ministry official questioned, her sweet tone still laced with the fact that she merely wished to get rid of the child so she could go home herself. The Scottish woman nodded almost immediately, reaching out a hand for the infant's.

"Yes, I think I will. Narcissa, would you like to go?" she asked. For the first time, when she was asked a question in the Ministry, she felt as if her answer really mattered, and so spoke it clearly.

"Yes." she replied, with a genuine smile. After everything that had gone wrong that evening, something was finally going right.

The moment her response was given, Minerva grasped little Narcissa's hand, reaching down with the other to lift the young girl off the ground, hoisting her up onto her hip. Though she did not quite know why, Narcissa felt just as safe embraced in Minerva's arms as she had done in Bellatrix's. Almost as safe as she had in her own mother's.

Only a half hour had passed when they finally arrived at Hogwarts School, and, even in her desperately tired state, Narcissa could not help but marvel at the beauty of the ancient stonework, feeling the magic of the place itself prickling at her skin like tiny bolts of lightning, working its way into her very blood.

Now that she was in the shadow of the castle, the young girl could easily see why people had considered the place to be so brilliant. It was utterly astounding to look at, and the place's reputation preceded it. Before she even entered the doorway, Narcissa knew that she would be happy there.

"What do you think of it, Narcissa?" came a voice from above her, where Minerva had whispered the question into her ear. "Do you like Hogwarts?"

As a haze of fatigue took over her mind, the night of sobbing and mourning her loss finally taking its toll on the little girl, all her body would allow herself to do was to nod her head, smiling a little as she did so to show her sincerity. Minerva laughed at this, stroking a stray curl away from the child's forehead as her eyelids began to droop.

"Well, I hope that it will live up to your expectations, little one." Minerva told her, her voice beginning to blur and meld together as Narcissa began to slip away into the clutches of sleep. "And I hope that I will, as well."

A/N: I'll try and get the next chapter up ASAP, but please review. I am not kidding at all when I say that it makes the next chapter come faster.


	4. Anastasia Selwyn

Chapter Four

A/N: Thank you so much to LilyPhoenix, , Lola, kittyhawk09 and Guest for helping me to improve and update the story.

It had only been a single night, and already Narcissa felt that she belonged at Hogwarts School. The magic of the place surrounded her, entering her body and soul with every breath she took, and made her feel as if she were at home, a feeling the young girl never thought she would experience again, after her home was razed to the ground by the so called Death Eaters. She felt that she was a part of the school, and that the school was a part of her.

Another place in her heart had been awarded to Minerva, who, over the short day she had known her, had won a special place in Narcissa's heart, and, although she did not yet know it, Narcissa had won a special place in the professor's.

The woman herself was currently stood in the Headmaster's office, alongside her former Transfiguration professor, Albus Dumbledore, who had been employed a few years previously to take over the position from Armando Dippet. The man was sat at his desk, a pair of half-moon spectacles balancing precariously on the bridge of his nose, as he leant further towards the woman, intently listening as his hands clasped together.

"And what do you wish to ask, Minerva?" Dumbledore asked, addressing his colleague. The woman sighed a little, as if considering what she would say, but then spoke.

"I wanted to ask you about a certain child." she began, pausing a little in her speech. At this point, Dumbledore was completely unaware that Narcissa was even at Hogwarts, let alone that she was under Minerva's care and protection. "She is a very important girl, and she has been through a terrible time of late. She's only young, and she has had far too much bad luck for someone of her age."

"So what do you wish to do about this?" he asked her, for once looking as if he truly did not know the answer to the question he posed to her, a rare thing for a man as talented as himself. "What is to be done about the girl?"

"That was what I came to ask you about, Albus." Minerva admitted, taking a deep breath to prepare her for the lengthy conversation she was about to partake in. "I've been named her guardian by the Ministry, for her own protection. Given that I am in residence here, that would mean that Narcissa would have to come and live at Hogwarts, with me. I need your permission for that to happen."

"Where is the girl now?" Dumbledore question, though this time with a glint in his eye, one that only appeared when he already knew the answer to a question, and only sought to ask it to be awkward. It was a habit of his that Minerva had learnt of over the years, and had been victim of on more than a few occasions during that time.

"She is already here." the Scot answered honestly, seeing no point in lying if the man before her more than likely knew the truth anyway. "She's asleep in my bedroom."

"Ah." was the only hint of response that the woman received, though the smile on the elder man's face told her that he was not annoyed, or indeed surprised, by this revelation in the least. "So, Minerva, why do you seek my permission on this matter if you already seem to have resolved it yourself?"

The question threw the woman a little, as she had been expecting at least a slight negative response from her employer. "Well, I didn't really want for you to find out from someone else. I suppose I wasn't really asking for permission, I was more… informing you of the situation."

"I had suspected that, yes. Excuse me, Narcissa?" the man asked, seeming extremely interested in the name.

"Yes." Minerva replied, a little unsure as to what had interested the man about her new adoptive daughter.

"The youngest Black girl? The daughter of the couple that died in the fire at their manor?" Albus continued, his interest heightened with every word he spoke. Only now did Minerva understand. Her employer had read the story in the _Daily Prophet_ a few days ago. '_Well, of course he has.'_ Minerva told herself. '_Everyone knows what happened. Everyone except the girls themselves, it seems__.__'_

"Yes. Given that she's so young, she hasn't been corrupted by the family's ideals of Pureblood supremacy, unlike her sisters, so the Ministry felt that it would be best for her to come somewhere with equal rights for all magical people, and there is no better place with those ideals than Hogwarts. That's why she was left with me." Minerva explained, going into depth for the sake of no more questions being posed towards her. Unfortunately, her tactics were not successful, as Dumbledore continued to speak.

"But if the children come to Hogwarts and see that she is a Black, surely they'll educate her about supremacy." he pointed out. This, luckily, was a point that the woman had been expecting to hear.

"Then she'll need to take another name. A fictional one, from a family that are hardly heard of." she answered immediately. When the Headmaster nodded his head at her, the woman continued. "My sister in law is from a family like that, from the Selwyns. No one has heard from that family in years, it's perfect. If I say that she is my niece, then no one will ask any questions about her. It's the best option, for us and for her."

"Are you certain about this?" Dumbledore asked, seeming a little sceptical about the idea.

"Absolutely." she replied, showing not a hint of the fear she was experiencing, at the prospect of being the only one responsible for the child. "In that case, I think that I'll call her Anastasia. Anastasia Selwyn."

She who would rise again.

A/N: Thank for reading so far, but please review!


	5. A Lie Regretted

Chapter Five

A/N: Thanks to LillyPhoenix, as always, for reviewing.

For Anastasia, or so she had become accustomed to being named, the next three years passed with a great amount of ease. Life at Hogwarts was not as difficult to settle into as she had expected it would be, and within a month, she was highly regarded among all of the professors at the school, particularly the headmaster.

However, for Minerva, life had not quite been so easy. Each day when she woke in her bed, though she was truly for what she had received, the woman could not help but think of Narcissa's family, back when she had been Narcissa. To think that their child, that they had loved and cherished, had been taken from them, and that she had been responsible for taking her away from them. She had never felt more guilt for anything in all the years she had lived, yet every time she saw the child smile, or perform the slightest piece of the magic which she could not yet control, it all seemed to have been worth the pain.

Often, when she looked at her young 'daughter', the Scottish woman wondered if she truly remembered her sisters, and the family that she had used to know. She was still young at the age she was now, but when her home had burnt down, and her parents with it, she had been but two years old. How could she possibly recall something from so long ago?

However, Minerva knew that it was probably not the fact that Anastasia may remember her sisters that bothered her, though it certainly did do so. It was the fact that, should she recall the details of her former life, the young girl may turn away from her, or worse, even hate her guardian for her part in separating them. Given the amount she had come to truly love the child, the woman had found that this was what she feared the most.

The main reason that was she was thinking of this was the fact that Bellatrix, the elder of the girl's trueborn sisters, was to begin attending Hogwarts as a student that coming September, something that could put the entire relationship she had built up with her adoptive daughter in jeopardy. While she may have been the one that Anastasia thought of as a mother, or at least the only mother she had known, Bellatrix was her own flesh and blood. To her, she would always be Narcissa, and it would not be difficult to convince the child of the girl she had once been, as she remembered next to nothing about the life she had lived previous to the one she had at Hogwarts.

However, as September drew ever closer, Minerva was shocked to find that she and her young ward grew closer with it. It was almost as if the girl herself sensed that a divide was coming to break them apart, and wished to remain as close as possible to the woman she called a mother, in an attempt to keep them from separating at all, as if clinging to her would make it all alright. '_She is still so young.'_ Minerva thought, truthfully enough. '_Of course she believes that clinging to me will make it all alright. That is what I would have believed at her age, after all.'_

The sudden sound of her bedroom door being opened brought the woman swiftly from her thoughts, and she raised her head from the window, which she had been glancing out of for the past few minutes, staring in longing at the Scottish moors, as she always did when contemplating something important, to make herself feel a little less homesick, which had been the main issue when she had first started to do so, back when she had been in her first year at Hogwarts herself.

Around the edge of the time worn mahogany, a flash of blonde hair appeared, bringing a smile to the professor's face that had been absent ever since the previous evening, when the news of Bellatrix had first come to her attention.

"Hello, Annie." Minerva greeted, beckoning the child into the room. She entered a little hesitantly, shutting the door behind her.

"Good morning, Mum." she responded, smiling faintly as she sat down beside the woman on the window seat. "Are you alright?"

"Yes, sweetheart. I'm alright." the woman answered, not altogether truthfully, but she did not wish to give away the secret of the young girl's sister, and she knew that, should she answer in the negative, Anastasia would wish to know why. "Are you?"

"Yes." she told her mother, a little too quickly, then continued at the professor's raised eyebrows. "Well, I was just wondering something, about a dream I had last night."

"What were you wondering, sweetheart?" Minerva was a little confused by the statement her adoptive daughter had made, as she was not giving much away. However, she was more than shocked at the question she girl asked in response.

"Was I always called Anastasia? Anastasia Selwyn?" she asked, in quite a soft voice. "Because I had a dream, and in the dream, someone was calling out to me. A woman, with blonde hair and blue eyes, like me. She called me Narcissa."

Suddenly, the woman could hardly breathe. Anastasia, or so she had been called, not for her life, but for only a three year period, was beginning to remember the girl she had been previously. In a dream or otherwise, she was beginning to remember, and now Minerva felt more threatened than ever by her sister.

When Narcissa had first come to her, the Transfiguration professor had gone to see her sister in law, the wife of her younger brother, Malcolm McGonagall, and asked her whether or not she would give permission for Narcissa to be given the surname that the woman had held before her marriage, which had been Selwyn. The woman had agreed wholeheartedly, only wishing to make life better for the poor child, and she had also suggested the first name, Anastasia, to give her a whole new start at Hogwarts.

However, when Minerva had returned to the castle, she returned to a frightened young child who did not seem to know anything about the world she had entered into, the cause of which later being found to be a memory charm cast by the Ministry.

The woman had opened her mouth to say this to her adoptive daughter, to confess it all to her and explain that the dream had been of the mother she was meant to have known. And she wished that she had done. But she did not. Instead, she answered in a simple, falsified sentence.

"No, Annie. You've always been you."

A/N: Uh oh, ripples are emerging! Please review!


	6. Just Dreams

Chapter Six

A/N: Thank you to sammiSTRICK and kittyhawk09 for reviewing!

The very end of August arrived far sooner than it had been expected to do, and still Minerva could tell that the dreams of the past Annie had been experiencing had not ceased. She had not spoken of them to her, nor to any other members of staff that she had come to trust, namely Dumbledore and Poppy Pomfrey, but the woman could tell that they still plagued her twilight hours, whether she wished to discuss that fact or not.

However, the fact that Bellatrix Black would be coming to Hogwarts in only one day's time made the situation even worse, as the Scottish woman now did not know whether or not she had been included in the visions or otherwise. If she had been, her relationship with her adoptive daughter, the eleven year old's sister, was in serious jeopardy.

That evening, once the sun had retreated below the line of the horizon, Minerva knocked on Annie's door with one hand, the other having a cup of hot chocolate balanced on it, something of a peace offering in advance, before Bellatrix arrived to change things for them. Upon the girl's summons, she turned the handle, a little awkwardly, and entered the room, placing a smile on her face before he did so, one which increased by far as she saw the child lying in bed, clutching a teddy bear affectionately to her chest, as her eyelids began to drift shut.

"Hello, Mum." the young girl greeted, her eyes opening a little wider as she did so, in an obvious attempt for her to keep herself awake long enough to speak to the woman. "Are you alright?"

"Yes, sweetheart, I am." the professor responded, moving forward so that she was seated beside her daughter on the bed. The child immediately attempted to move from her position below the covers, so that she could actually sit by her mother, but she was immediately stayed by a gentle hand on her shoulder, pushing her back into the soft pillows. "Are you?"

"I'm fine." The response came instantly, as if she had been expecting the question and had prepared the answer in advance to make sure that she sounded as convincing as she possibly could. "I honestly am, Mum."

"Are you still having those nightmares? About the blonde woman, calling to you?" the woman asked, and her daughter's composure faltered. She had always been very skilled in acting, but even she could not keep up the appearances when she was cornered in such a way. "Annie?"

"They aren't nightmares. They're just dreams." the young girl protested, with a slight sigh, which could easily have been a yawn, had the blonde not had an expression on her face which suggested that she was extremely unhappy about the talk. However, she could not maintain the silence for much longer, and so whispered the answer that her mother desired. "Yes."

"Why didn't you tell me, sweetheart?" she questioned, a little frustrated, although she tried very hard not to let it show. She did not especially like getting annoyed at children to a great extent when there was a way around doing so, and felt doubly bad doing so when directed at her young daughter.

"I didn't want you to worry about me." the blonde replied, her voice a quiet sigh. It was clear that she was a little fearful about the woman's reaction to the admittance, though her adoptive mother had never even considered hurting the girl, particularly not over anything she had said, and never would do so. If she spoke truthfully, Minerva was immediately saddened by this, despite the fact that she knew why she had reacted in such a way.

Poppy Pomfrey, when she had checked the blonde over upon her arrival at Hogwarts, had told her fellow professor with a heavy heart that she would most likely retain the fear in her subconscious for a good few years, if not for longer. Now, Narcissa - '_No. Annie.' _Minerva told herself - was finally about to feel the consequences of the trauma she had suffered as a baby.

"Annie, I worry more about you when you keep things from me than I do when you tell me about your dreams." the Scottish woman explained, pulling the child closer to her, so that she was leant entirely on her right shoulder. "I am here for you, and I always will be. That is not going to change, whether you have a dream that you think might worry me or not. Do you understand that?"

"Yes, Mum." she told the woman, wrapping her arms tightly around the woman's waist and burying her head in her shoulder, a smile finally illuminating her face. Minerva could not help herself for breathing a sigh of relief at that moment, as she had been extremely worried about the child in her care, thinking that she was unhappy, that she was fearful, that she would figure out what had happened in the past and would hate her adoptive parent for it. Luckily, none of those things had happened, and she was extremely glad for this, as it was a nightmare of her own, and had been for many years, that Annie would reject her in favour of her true born family.

"I love you, my darling Annie. I hope that you know that." the Scottish professor sighed, as she tucked the young blonde underneath the covers, making sure to cover the stuffed toy in the girl's arms as well, something which made her giggle a little, though she did so sleepily, as she was almost lost to sleep at such a time of night as it was.

"I love you as well, Mum." the girl finished, already drifting away into the clutches of sleep, a pleasant darkness consuming her waking hours.

That night, amid the darkness, Annie dreamt once again of a blonde woman with blue eyes. A woman who called her Narcissa.

A/N: So, here comes Bellatrix, but will she recognise her? Please review, so you can find out quicker!


	7. A Snake in the Grass

Chapter Seven

A/N: Thank you to sammiSTRICK and kittyhawk09 for reviewing the last chapter.

The night of the Sorting Ceremony had come, and Minerva had been a great deal more than worried about the fact that Bellatrix Black had turned up on the doorstep a few moments ago, along with the rest of those who would be her classmates.

To ensure that the two did not meet, the woman had instructed Annie that she must stay in her bedroom, and that if she did not, she would be punished for it. She had never been threatened with punishment before, as her adoptive mother did not like to use such harsh treatments to correct behaviour, believing that talking would be of greater consequence in the future, but because it was so new to her, she had obeyed without question. It was a terrible tactic to use, and the professor was not very happy about having done so, but she had seen no other road to walk down. The eleven year old was far too much of a threat to her daughter, or to her remaining as such, at least.

However, Minerva's attention was brought back to the formality when Amelia Abbott flew to her seat on the Hufflepuff table, and it was time for the next name to be called. Glancing down to her list, the woman saw that it was the turn of none other than the girl herself.

"Bellatrix Black!"

As she approached the stool, it seemed that Bellatrix had an air about her, an air of snobbery, feeling that she was better than everyone else, no doubt because she was a member of the small number of families who carried pure Wizarding blood in their veins, though almost everyone outside of the circles was sure that this was utterly untrue. It was that very idea of being better than others that Minerva had taken Narcissa in to avoid, as she had remained too young at the time to truly understand her family's teachings.

The moment she sat down, the professor tentatively put the Sorting Hat down onto her head, already seeming to know what its cry would say. True enough, not a moment after it had brushed a curl on her head, the Hat screamed out its answer, one which came as no surprise to anyone in the room.

"Slytherin!"

The table of the serpents erupted with cheers, and they screamed their pride in having such a revered Pureblood in their midst. She was, after all, from one of the houses rumoured to have utterly pure blood, and the members of the House of Black were the only ones, bar the Malfoys, who did not have an incident on record where a child had been anything but a Slytherin, who in later life would marry another Pureblood, and so it would begin again, for centuries and centuries to come.

When she had read out the name of the next student, Apollo Burke, who also joined the Slytherins, though he did not get so good a response as his predecessor, the professor managed to get a proper look at Bellatrix. She had the imposing bone structure of the Blacks, and the heavily lidded eyes that had been a trait of the Bulstrodes, a family that had married into the house a few generations back from the girl who had inherited them. From sight and memory, there was not a scrap of the Rosier blood in the girl, and nowhere near to the extent of her youngest sister if there was. She was a Black through and through, another reminder of why she had been right to separate the eldest from the baby.

However, just as she read the next name, her thoughts seemed to become reality, as, out of the corner of her eye, she caught Annie sneak into the room, sitting herself down on the floor beside Madam Pomfrey, who immediately pulled her up and onto the chair which her mother had vacated, though not at all without kindness in her smile that was equal as it was in her actions. She did not know that Minerva was horrified by this turn of events, even more so when she turned to see that the majority of the Slytherins were staring at the girl. And Bellatrix was too.

'_This cannot be happening.'_ the woman told herself, wishing she could believe it, but evidently not doing so, as she was beginning to panic to such an extent that she handed Filius Flitwick, the new Charms professor, the scroll of names, and all but ran to take her daughter from the room.

On the way back to her chambers, Minerva did not berate or lecture the girl, nor did she give any response to her behaviour at all, as her mind was so consumed with thoughts and fears. '_What if Bellatrix recognised her? If she knows that Narcissa is here with me, then she might try to turn her against me. Or worse, she might try to take her away. Please say that she didn't recognise her. Oh, please, good Merlin, say that she did not recognise my little girl.'_

Professor McGonagall did not speak another word to the child as she put her to bed, merely pressed a kiss to her forehead and vacated the space, still hoping beyond hoping that something would have stopped the girl from recognising the younger. After all, Narcissa had changed a great deal in all the years that had passed, and she was no longer the cherub cheeked toddler she had been the last time Bellatrix had seen her. She was hardly even recognisable as the same person, so perhaps Minerva had a chance there. It was the last shred of hope that she had to cling to, and no matter what it cost her, she would not let it go.

Meanwhile, downstairs in the Slytherin commons, a young girl with wild dark hair sat on a settee, thinking about the girl she had seen in the Great Hall, and trying to remember why the child seemed so very familiar.

A/N: Trouble is coming. Please review!


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